


Burn Out Bright

by nightmare_kisser



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Zombies, Cannibalism, F/M, M/M, The Infected, Zombie Apocalypse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-09-29
Updated: 2012-09-29
Packaged: 2017-11-15 06:26:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,649
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/524117
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nightmare_kisser/pseuds/nightmare_kisser
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>As far as science is concerned, it’s only an illness, like so many others, that can be cured and controlled.</p>
<p>As far as the public is concerned, it’s a zombie apocalypse film come to life.</p>
<p>And as far as Sherlock Holmes is concerned, it’s the greatest puzzle of all time.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Burn Out Bright

**Author's Note:**

> A thank-you oneshot for Brit (adlergasm on Tumblr). C:
> 
> I apologize in advance for any and all Americanisms, and all my American spelling.

Someone dropped dead in the middle of a Tesco. That is, they say, the beginning of the breakout of Europe’s new black plague making its way to London.

It’s not quite the bubonic plague, not as it was when it first devastated Europe. It’s a mutagen of the virus, a new string of it altogether, and it spreads a lot faster than it did in the past, and it’s about five times more deadly.

Because this version of it doesn’t only give you ring-around-the-rosie sores and high fevers; it quite literally makes you akin to the living dead.

Rotting flesh like leprosy; fevers that cook your body from the inside-out; bloodshot, crusting, oozing eyes; a lack of pain sensory; and cannibalistic urges.

As far as science is concerned, it’s only an illness, like so many others, that can be cured and controlled.

As far as the public is concerned, it’s a zombie apocalypse film come to life.

And as far as Sherlock Holmes is concerned, it’s the greatest puzzle of all time.

xXxXx

“Sherlock, I don’t feel comfortable with this. I am all for medical study and autopsies and what-have-you, but this feels… barbaric.”

“She must be studied, John,” Sherlock reminds crisply, taking a scalpel and cutting the woman open very carefully, their hazmat suits and gas masks and goggles a bit stuffy and hot and sweaty, but necessary. The virus is still contagious for a week after death. This woman had only been dead for six hours. And she’s only dead because she was killed right in Baker Street by one of the many survivalists who claim these people are no longer people anymore and must be taken out.

“I know she must, but… We saw her get murdered, Sherlock! Shouldn’t we be going after the man who did it? He’s used a croquet mallet, for Christ’s sake,” John grinds out from behind his mask. “He bashed her bloody skull in!”

“Which is regrettable; I had been hoping to perform a cat-scan of her brain to see what changes the virus creates in it as compared to the average human brain. But it seems that is the only way to keep them from biting you, since they cannot feel much, if any, pain when struck anywhere else. Even removal of the heart seems to make them stagger and slow, but not kill them. It’s impossible, so I need to study how it is probable, if – Hmm. That’s odd,” Sherlock frowns.

“What is it? I can’t see through these damn goggles; they keep fogging up.”

“Her blood is… it’s far too coagulated for six hours post-mortem. It appears as though she’s been dead for a couple weeks, but that can’t be possible; we just saw her die hours ago!”

“What? How can that be? Let me see,” John cries in bewilderment, shoving a stunned Sherlock aside and prodding inside the dead woman with a dissecting utensil. “I’ll be damned,” John murmurs under his breath, “It’s true. Her blood is practically gone, it’s so gooey and flaky. How the hell –”

“This requires further investigation.”

“Jesus,” John says as he steps back, allowing Sherlock to take control again. “This really is a zombie scenario. Fuck.”

“Shut up, John! That’s nonsense. They can’t be…” He struggles with the ludicrous word, “ _Zombies._ There has to be a logical explanation for –”

“Sherlock! Will you look at her? She’s not logical at all! Her heart hasn’t been circulating that blood since she most likely reached the climax of her illness, when the fever cooked her, and the only thing keeping her going this whole time has been that bloody virus! It’s the only thing that makes sense!” John shouts, shoving Sherlock’s shoulder, jarring the suit a bit.

“That can’t be possible! How can a virus keep a host body functional when the host is deceased? Viruses are meant to die when its host dies!”

“Not this one. They even said on the news that this thing is… is mutated from the bubonic plague and is all forms of nasty the world has yet to see. And you even said so yourself, once you rule everything out, whatever’s left, however improbable, must be –”

“Shut up! Shut up! I know, I know, but…” Sherlock stresses, flinging down his tool and pacing the length of their kitchen table, where the woman is laid out. He shakily puts his hands together in a prayer-like gesture and closes his eyes tightly. It looks odd with the bulky suit shrouding him. “It just doesn’t seem _physically possible._ ”

“I’m beginning to think to hell with science and the laws of physics; we should be thinking of a way to get through this while the real scientists come up with a cure,” John counters sharply. “I don’t want to go bashin’ in people’s brains with croquet mallets, but I don’t want to get sick or die, either.”

Sherlock spins to face John and his hands drop and his eyes open wide. “Yes, but would you? If it came down to one of the infected tearing out your intestines while you’re still conscious or you putting a bullet in their head, would you?”

“Of course I bloody would! What kind of question is that? I would do it if my life or yours were in jeopardy, just as I would shoot a violent criminal coming toward us, but as it stands, I’m not the sort who’s going to go out there and kill infected people for the thrill of it!” John retorts. “God, what’s gotten into you?”

“I don’t know. I – my mind is racing too quickly, jumping to scenarios and conclusions I shouldn’t be coming to –” Sherlock frets as he starts pacing again, his hazmat suit preventing him from ruffling his hair and rubbing his face like he wants to. He knocks himself in the head and bumps the mask more than once. He spins on his heel, hands clasped behind his back, some of his calm restored from panic. “Dispose of her, John. I don’t think she will be of much more use to us. From what I can deduce, this is bigger than even me, and science isn’t going to win out over fear this time, not like at Baskerville. No, this is far worse. We need to start planning how we will survive, and not how to fix things.”

John hesitates. “Hang on, there. Sherlock, you’re scaring me. Are you implying –?!”

The taller man cuts him off with an abrupt, “Yes, John. That this is the end of the world as we know it. That’s precisely what I’m implying. With a calamity of this magnitude, there is no feasible way the world will be able to be restored to what we knew. People are changing, either from the disease or by the ripple effect of it. Society is crumbling. I understand, now: all we can do is prepare for the worst and pray we make it through this without disaster and destruction striking either of us.”

xXxXx

John goes out. He means to pay for the supplies Sherlock wrote down for him to collect, but there is no one at the registers. In fact, there isn’t an employee in sight. Much of the store has been looted of half of the things John is meant to get, but he perseveres; he goes to multiple stores and steals a shopping cart and gets, in the end, everything Sherlock requires.

Canned foods, bottled water, vitamin tablets of various sorts for the foods that don’t have all the nutrients they need, excess amounts of toilet paper, blankets, towels, bandages and other first-aid medical supplies, weapons (knives and guns, mostly), ammo, gunpowder, matches, gasoline, firewood, an axe, wooden planks, nails (they have a hammer at the flat, somewhere, amongst Mrs. Hudson’s things), and torches with extra batteries, plus a lantern and buzz saw. And, of course, plenty of extra tea and coffee. Only powdered milk, though. It will have to do.

You would think there was a war coming. Maybe there is. Many people have the same idea in mind, too, seeing as half the supplies on the list were in low supply or gone entirely from a certain store or another.

When John gets home, Mrs. Hudson is all a flutter and shaking worse than usual, her old age not the cause. She sees all his supplies and becomes frantic.

“John, dear, what on Earth is going on? Why are you wearing a gas mask? Why do you have all those things? Are we going to be bombed again? Do we need a shelter?”

“No, Mrs. Hudson,” John replies as softly as he’s able. His throat is dry, his words a bit hoarse. He swallows thickly and takes her shaking, veiny hands. “It’s going to be all right. It’s just this virus, Mrs. Hudson; it changes people. And we don’t want to get it. That’s all. We’re stocking up so we don’t have to leave the flat.”

“Then what are these for?” she remarks in a small voice, lightly pointing to the boards lying across the width of the cart.

“To board up the doors and windows so no one can get inside. Sherlock already has a blowtorch, and we’re going to use it to melt some of the locks and hinges. We’ll make our emergency escape route the fire escape.”

“Oh… That’s… that’s very clever, that is. Yes, that… that will be much safer,” she murmurs, going into a state of shock.

“Mrs. Hudson? Maybe you better have a lie-down. Here, take one of these blankets,” John says softly, picking one out of the cart, removing a tag, and draping it over her shoulders. “I’ll come in and board everything up for you, and then you can have a rest. Would you like some tea?”

“Yes… thank you… that would be best…” Mrs. Hudson carries on in a distant manner, and John guides her to her flat and tucks her in, getting what she needs.

Then John goes to work cutting down the boards and hammering them up over everything that needs it. Before he can start, however, he does hear Mrs. Hudson’s kittenish voice behind him.

“Take down the curtains, please, dear. Won’t have them ruined, you know. Paid good money for those curtains. Fold them, would you, and put them away in the bottom drawer of my wardrobe? Like that. Thank you.”

And when he’s done, he leaves her flat, closing the door, and moves on to board up every other entrance in the lower floors of the building.

xXxXx

“Ah, I knew I heard you downstairs. Is everything secure down there?” Sherlock asks once John returns, sweating up a storm, to the upper floor.

“Yes,” the doctor pants, “And if you help me carry the cart up, I can get started up here.”

For once, Sherlock doesn’t complain or protest. He stands, follows John downstairs, and together, the two grown men haul up the shopping cart to the second floor, and get to work – together – assembling their safe-house.

xXxXx

They barricade themselves in the flat as if it were a bomb shelter. The fallout of the mayhem outside barely scathes them; they are safe behind their walls.

Or so they thought.

The violence becomes radical; even the non-infected start to lose their minds in the chaos, panic and fear overwhelming them to drive them to drastic measures. Someone comes in with a chainsaw and hacks down the boarded front door, looking for food and something to kill.

“Sherlock…” grinds out John, his tone threatening and weary. His breath hitches and he cocks his gun. He aims it at the door leading to their flat. They hear footsteps on the stairs. “Sherlock!”

“I hear them,” the consulting detective emerges from his bedroom, armed to the teeth. He hands Mrs. Hudson one of his weapons. “Use this to protect yourself,” he informs her, and she sputters something for a moment, unsure, before solidifying her resolve with a swallow and nodding curtly. He nods back. Then, he faces his partner. “Ready when you are.”

The door bursts down and the two stand side by side and begin firing openly.

Nothing but bloody mulch in heaps remain, gore splattered on the walls. Mrs. Hudson sobs hysterically, but keeps it mostly to herself.

“We can’t stay here anymore. We need to keep moving,” John states immediately as he reloads his weapons. “We’ll gather what we can, put them in backpacks, and head out. Where should we aim to go?”

“I hear it’s still relatively safe in Canada. We need to find way there. But first we need to get off the British Isles, which will be difficult. It will be even worse in the heart of Europe, like France and Italy and Germany and the like. But Russia is also relatively clean, particularly the more Northern, colder parts. If we can’t find a flight to Canada, we’ll head for Russia,” Sherlock relays swiftly and smoothly, clicking his guns into safety and strapping them to himself. “And we need to stay clean. These people weren’t infected yet, but they could be carriers for the virus. We mustn’t let their blood –”

“I understand,” John says with a wave of his hand. He turns back to Mrs. Hudson. “You’re coming with us, aren’t you, Mrs. Hudson?”

Her kitten heels clatter softly as she forces herself to her feet. “Dear me, no. I can’t, loves. My hip won’t make the trip, and I have a sister, you know. I’ll see if she’s still alive, and stay with her in the country. It’s all I can manage.”

John smiles fondly and touches her shoulder. “All right, then, Mrs. Hudson. Goodbye,” he murmurs, bringing her close and hugging her, a few tears spilling from his eyes.

Even Sherlock, callous as he may seem, rubs at his eyes and stoops to embrace her afterward. “Goodbye,” he says lowly, clearing his throat as he stands. He sniffs, but none of his tears are visible. He can work up false ones to manipulate any time he wants, but in a time like this, he can’t seem to cry at all. The irony isn’t lost on John.

“All right. Time to go,” John says a few moments later, after their supplies are packed. They see Mrs. Hudson off in a stolen, abandoned vehicle, shotgun and shells in the passenger seat, and wish her well with a wave in her rearview mirror.

Then the two men start off down the road, shooting at anything stumbling and dead-looking that moves into their path.

xXxXx

They come across Lestrade in the crossfire between themselves and a horde of particularly cannibalistic zombies, hissing and gnawing on their most recent kill, blood dripping from their lips and skin caught between their decaying teeth.

“Greg! Boy, am I glad to see you,” John hollers from across the street, Lestrade hunched behind a car parallel to theirs. They use the automobiles as shields and fire at the zombies scrambling toward them from down the road.

“Same to you! Bloody damn glad you aren’t corpses to boot! Where are you headed?” he yells back before firing a few rounds at a scantily clad woman who must have been a stripper on the job when she got infected. She falls backward mid-step when two bullets blow a hole in her skull. Her dirty hair covers her face and her fingers give one final twitch before Lestrade reloads and steps around her, jogging over to the familiar pair.

“We _were_ headed for Canada, but no ruddy airport is fuctional, and the one that was refused to send anyone abroad! Had to be to someone else in the Isles, because they don’t want to ‘spread the disease to other countries.’ Fools don’t seem to realize this is pretty global; there have been breakouts somewhere in every continent, usually where the population is dense and the pollution is the worst: Mexico, China, India, America, Europe, us. The only places that are doing well are the places it’s too cold for the virus, like the Himalayas and half of Russia and most of Canada, and places isolated like Australia!”

“You’ve got to be kidding me,” Lestrade deadpans.

Sherlock nods in confirmation after striking down two of the living dead behind Lestrade. He cocks his gun again to release the empty shells. “It’s true. I have done extensive research on it in our travels across the Isles to find a way out. But it seems now that our only option is to hijack a boat across the Channel and find other airports, or take trains or cars or whatever we can get our hands on and make it to Russia. We need to be where it’s cold if we want to survive. The corpses there are too sluggish if they become infected, and for the most part, only outsides are the infected ones there. This virus seems to dislike the cold.”

“Well, all right, then,” Lestrade nods. “I’m sold. Let’s get a move on.”

xXxXx

Mycroft joins their group when he calls Sherlock’s phone and instructs them to meet him at a specific pier on the Channel.

As it turns out, he’s their ticket off the British Isles. And their ticket to Russia.

“Government officials who weren’t infected got full access and support to get themselves and any uninfected ‘loved ones’ away from this… well, I can only call it a hell-hole, can’t I?” Mycroft says at length, his hands on the steering wheel of a yacht as he calls down to the men on the pier. “So climb aboard; it seems you are the only ‘loved ones’ I can offer my services to.”

Lestrade makes a face at that, but is the first to rush up on deck, eager to get away from the chaos of London. “Well, come on, then! Do you want to get out alive, or don’t you?”

“I have no problem with living, no,” John says as he just as eagerly climbs up.

Sherlock, meanwhile, is sighing and rolling his eyes. Why must his brother always make out like a selfless martyr when he isn’t? But… “Well, it would have made all other efforts meaningless if we don’t, I suppose,” Sherlock grumbles, reluctantly joining the rest on his brother’s yacht. He makes sure to be on the far opposite side of the boat as the elder Holmes. Mycroft doesn’t comment on it whatsoever.

And together, the five of them (because Anthea _is_ on board; she is merely below deck, texting who she still can) head down and across the English Channel, until they arrive somewhere that doesn’t look half as destroyed as what they see along the way.

xXxXx

They stumble across other survivors – a teenage boy and his little brother; a woman who can’t speak English, but knows sign language, and communicates with Sherlock; and of all people, Irene Adler.

“Not dead, then, are you?” Mycroft muses. “I have never been fooled by anyone so well. Did Sherlock help you?”

“He did, in fact,” Irene says as she ties a tourniquet on her arm; not a bite, thankfully, but a bullet wound. John accidentally grazed her when he was fighting off a horde. She was running for her life from the same horde. “And it seems I not only owe him my life, but you as well, Dr. Watson. How ever will I replay the two of you, such remarkable men as you are?” and she smiles through her pain as she keeps her hand over the bandaged wound; she insisted on taking care of it herself, leaving the army doctor free to be a soldier instead, because there is still another wave coming (she attracts attention like no other, and it would be smirk-inducing were it not for the situation).

“You can start by telling us anything you know about the virus,” Mycroft cuts in, before Sherlock can speak.

“Oh, I had a feeling you would ask that,” she muses, seemingly flippant. She shakes her head. “But I only know a couple things. I have a scientist friend, you see – well, she’s not really my friend, just another client, but she’s very talkative when others like to cuddle, if you catch my drift – and she informed me of two things: one, that there isn’t a cure. It’s impossible to create when the virus strain is so mutated and destructive. And two, that your best bet is to head as far north or south as possible, and hide it out in the shivering cold.”

“We knew the second bit as much,” Sherlock relays with a sigh, “Due to reports of lack of outbreaks in the colder regions of the world. So that is nothing new. The cure, however… you’re sure?”

“I’m as positive as I am for hearing it from the source of one of the lead medical officers on the staff of scientists put together to come up with a cure for this plague,” she retorts briskly. “Do you know she even drew my blood and analyzed it before we did anything? She wanted to make sure I wasn’t infected, but she desperately needed the sex. ‘It’s the end of the world and I have never been with a woman, but I have always wanted to,’ she told me. And I was only fortunate that she found me, because she was able to give me this,” Irene holds out her phone, a list on the screen. “As payment, I asked her for a ticket away from this madness. She gave me a list of all the places they are taking survivors to prevent them from becoming ill, and protect them from the infected. I was headed there, and wouldn’t have made it if you lot hadn’t come along.”

Sherlock snatches up the familiar device and scans the text. It’s five photos of private documents revealing the addresses to multiple facilities in various cold-climate areas in the surrounding countries. Locations marked as “safe” in a woman’s handwriting, highlighted locations marked as “desirable; less crowded” in the same handwriting, and “proceed with caution” next to some of the others. One location is relatively near their current one; it’s a “rest stop” of sorts that offers armored cars to take healthy passengers to the larger facilities cross-country.

“It’s amazing what the UN will do in a crisis, isn’t it?” Irene remarks as she slides her phone out of Sherlock’s grip and tucks it away into her coat. “Suddenly countries stop feuding and open up their doors to their fellow man because everyone is in the same sinking ship. And all I had to do was sleep with a few people to gain VIP access.”

“Until you lost it, and wound up on your own. Tell me, who died? The female scientist, or another client of yours?” Sherlock deduces with a quirked brow. Irene’s face falls. “…Ah, it was the scientist, then. Where is your usual partner, by the way? The woman you were living with during our… main encounters of the past,” Sherlock asks.

Irene looks away, her features carefully schooled into non-expression. But that says enough for Sherlock.

“Oh, I see,” Sherlock murmurs. “My condolences.”

“What? Did she get infected?” John guesses, and Lestrade looks between them all with a confused look, but shrugs it off as they pick up their things and walk beyond fallen corpses and toward the shelter of an empty boxcar, derailed from the tracks thirty meters away.

“She did, judging by Miss Adler’s reaction. And you had to end her suffering, didn’t you?” Sherlock asks, but he isn’t being nearly as careless as he usually is. He sounds… nearly sympathetic, if the others didn’t know any better.

“I did what was necessary,” Irene utters hoarsely. “Now can we please drop the subject?”

“As you wish. But know that I understand. I’m not sure how I would react if I shared the same loss, to be honest,” Sherlock returns fluidly, but something in the clenching of his jaw gives him away.

“Hang on, who could you possibly care about if you lost them? Surely not any of us,” Lestrade doubts. “I know we’re somewhat chums and all, but this woman was her… significant other, yeah? So how could you possibly understand, Sherlock? My wife and I didn’t get on well near the end, but I still loved her. And I had to watch her die, do you know that? I didn’t have to kill her myself, no, but I know where this woman’s coming from. It hurts more than anything you will ever know,” Lestrade spits, angry tears streaming down his cheeks. He roughly wipes them away and tosses down his gun. “So don’t go telling her lies, you hear me? She doesn’t need that right now!”

“…I wasn’t lying,” Sherlock replies softly. Mycroft shares a look with his brother before glancing away. Anthea is always pretty quiet, but she is, for once, looking directly between everyone, her phone on silent in her pocket. The three spare survivors – the brothers and the signing woman – keep their noses out of the business. John attracts Sherlock’s gaze, and Sherlock holds it. “I would be… similarly affected, were I to lose John in all this.”

John blinks, lips parting to take a ragged breath. “Sherlock –”

“We need to keep moving,” Sherlock cuts him off, his eyes looking in other places, anywhere but at someone’s face. “We shouldn’t stay in one place for very long, not when there are more of the infected out there, their hunger insatiable. So rest up for a bit – Lestrade, you and I will keep watch for the time being, then we will switch, John and Irene taking the next shift, until all of us have slept for at least thirty minutes, the minimum required for power-naps – and then we will need to head out of this boxcar and find ourselves a working vehicle, one with gas and something easy to hotwire. We will head for the rest area, and look for a ride to one of the 'desired' facilities in Northern Russia. Agreed?”

No one disputes it. So they follow his command, and soon, they’re riding in a stolen car to their next location.

xXxXx

The brothers and foreign woman decide to stay and wait for the next ride when the London troupe fills the next outgoing transport.

“Are you sure you boys will be all right?” John asks worriedly, dropping to one knee to be roughly at the younger’s height. He places a hand on the boy’s shoulder, looking up between him and his older sibling.

The older of the two places his hand on his brother’s opposite shoulder, then nods down at John. “Ja, we’ll be fine,” he affirms. “No need to fret, Doctor.”

“As long as you’re sure,” John says with a sigh as he gets back on his feet again. “I won’t have you thinking we’re abandoning you, because we’re not.”

The younger boy smiles at him. “We know, Doctor. You have been like a father to us since we met. You have a very caring nature. It is good, in all of this. We thank you very much, but now is the time for you and your comrades to move on.”

John nods solemnly. As he loads into the back of the armored truck, he salutes the pair.

They salute him in return, and the woman calls out in her language before signing, “Fare well.”

xXxXx

When they reach the facility, all they find is a massacre.

Apparently, carriers from Egypt found their way into the base, and unwittingly spread the disease until all the people of the safe house consumed each other.

Anthea gets one look at it, and has to turn away to vomit, Mycroft holding back her hair and rubbing her arm soothingly, his own forehead clammy and his stomach churning violently.

Sherlock, John, and Lestrade have seen enough not to be too ill, but it makes them uneasy to see so many human teeth marks and torn flesh and marrow-sucked bones amidst dismembered limbs and exposed intestines and know that people were driven to this, to eat each in piles other until no one remained.

“…Onto plan B,” Sherlock utters at last, and the group retreats to the armed vehicle along with everyone else; everyone who wasn’t driven into a manic state of horror and woe by the sight, that is.

xXxXx

In the end, they wind up in a place with emergency lighting and food rations and blankets, and it’s cramped and miserable, but they are _alive._

But restless. So very, very restless.

“I hate this. We’re going to die either way, so why are we here? There’s no fighting this, you know,” Lestrade mutters icily, his leg bouncing frantically where he sits, a mug of watered-down coffee in his hands, verging on lukewarm. “What was the point?”

“Humans need a goal,” Irene recites vacantly. “They need a hope to follow, something that promises survival.”

“But this isn’t _living._ It’s getting by, sure, but it isn’t _living,_ ” Lestrade mutters angrily. “I wish I had stayed in rotten old London with the rest. At least I was _home._ This isn’t right. We’re all just… just _here_ , and there isn’t anything –”

“I have been thinking the same thing,” Sherlock agrees. It’s the first time he has spoken in a week. All eyes turn to him, and he has a deranged grin on his face. “Why are we cowering here? We should be fighting back. We should be crafting our own cure. I’m sure I could do it; I have been working it out for days. If I just had some supplies and test subjects, I’m sure I could succeed where others have failed.”

“This isn’t bloody _I Am Legend,_ Sherlock,” John interjects. “I know you didn’t see that one, but I did. It took years for a cure in that film, and it was done –”

“Fictitious, so I don’t care. I am talking about real life, John, right here and now: and I am telling you that I can _do_ it,” he snaps, turning his gaze on the doctor, a fire burning in his eyes. “Don’t you believe I could?”

It takes John a moment, but soon he’s signing and running a hand through his hair. “You know I do. If anyone would do it, it’s you, Sherlock.”

“Precisely,” the detective agrees as he stands abruptly and tosses off his blanket. “So what are we waiting for? Let’s recruit our arsenal from where they’ve stashed it, gather information about laboratories nearby, go out there, and slaughter our way through until we find the one we’re looking for, and get set on securing the place and finding a cure! There’s no use being in limbo here; we need to be active, or we might as well be one of the dead themselves.”

“You’re mad, Holmes, but I’m with you,” Irene says as she stands. She places her hand on his forearm. “I won’t have lost the people I have for nothing. And if this can benefit everyone else, I’m in.”

“Funny seeing you all eager to help others and not just yourself,” John says with a raised brow, standing as well.

“It helps me, too,” Irene winks. “If I can become immune or cured after being bitten, I’ll do it.”

“I might as well come with you all,” Mycroft says as he stands lazily and clasps his hands together in front of him. “Sherlock needs to be monitored in these situations.”

“I would normally say I’d rather you didn’t, but you’ve grown on me since this all began, Mycroft. So yes, fine, come with if you like.”

“I’m staying,” Anthea pipes up meekly. “I’m not cut out for this. I thought I was, but I’m not.” She shakes her head. “I’m staying here, where it’s safe."

“Suit yourself,” Mycroft answers, seemingly unfazed. But Sherlock notes the fidget in his fingers.

“Are you sure, Anthea? What if this turns out like the facility we first came across?” he reminds her, and she shudders involuntarily. “I’m sure Mycroft could use your support as well. You are, after all, the best assistant he has ever had.”

Mycroft turns to look back at her. “Yes, indeed. Please, won’t you accompany us? I have gotten you this far; you needn’t worry about getting harmed in the future.” He offers a hand down toward her.

She looks up at him, his extended hand, and in that moment, something clicks. She comes to the realization of the real reason behind his coaxing, and she smiles softly. “Yes, yes; all right. I’ll go,” she says quietly. She takes his hand, and he smiles at her as he helps her stand.

“Better to go out with a bang than fade into the background,” Sherlock remarks. “That is a bold philosophy, but one that’s oddly fitting in this circumstance, I believe. Now I think I understand some people’s life choices over the years. They wished to be remembered, or die trying.”

“And some people just don’t want to be idle,” John continues the thought as he slips his hand into Sherlock’s, startling the man a bit. “They don’t want to sit by and allow life to go on without them. You can’t have regrets; especially not at a time like this.”

Sherlock stares at him for a long while; with all John’s protesting, he really does care for Sherlock the same way Sherlock has cared uniquely for the doctor since essentially the beginning of their acquaintance. He smiles broadly, and John returns it with half the wattage, but just as much meaning.

Then the six of them make their way out of the safe house – fighting to do it, too, but succeeding, in the end, because no one wants six rogues to endanger the place – and get set on paving the road to restoring the lives the world once led.


End file.
